Ah, social media… And to think, I used to be so happy/completely obsessed with AOL Instant Messenger—
oh how we’ve evolved. My journey into the social media world began the summer after 5th grade when I convinced my mom I was “mature” enough to get a screen name, and thus TallGurl1221 was born. Fast forward to 8th grade, and suddenly Myspace was all the rage. In the Fall of my sophomore year in High School (2005), I was so agitated that I couldn’t access Myspace from the school’s computers that I decided to make a Facebook account. This was back when you had to be invited to join, and they only recently let high schooler kids in on the social network (you couldn’t befriend college kids at the time—perhaps they were trying to limit statutory rape,who knows). I’m not even going to delve into all the blogs I kept throughout the years, because obvi this one is the only one that matters.
But enough about my boring history. Today’s blog will be about why girls use today’s social media.
1. For Attention.
oh how we’ve evolved. My journey into the social media world began the summer after 5th grade when I convinced my mom I was “mature” enough to get a screen name, and thus TallGurl1221 was born. Fast forward to 8th grade, and suddenly Myspace was all the rage. In the Fall of my sophomore year in High School (2005), I was so agitated that I couldn’t access Myspace from the school’s computers that I decided to make a Facebook account. This was back when you had to be invited to join, and they only recently let high schooler kids in on the social network (you couldn’t befriend college kids at the time—perhaps they were trying to limit statutory rape,who knows). I’m not even going to delve into all the blogs I kept throughout the years, because obvi this one is the only one that matters.
But enough about my boring history. Today’s blog will be about why girls use today’s social media.
1. For Attention.
2. To be “Funny.”Funny is in quotes for two reasons. The first is because, as much as it pains me to say, girls are inherently not funny (obviously there are the exceptions that make the rule—Chelsea Handler, Amy Schumer, me). The second is because half the time girls try too hard to be funny, don’t know what funny is, or guys lie and tell them they’re funny in an effort to hook up with them, which is essentially an extension of the first reason. When we’re not seeking out attention for beauty acclaim, we’re carefully crafting out our word choices in an effort to make people laugh and thus receive more likes, re-tweets, shares, and comments. We’re selfish bitches—it’s not enough for you to comment on how jealous you are of our hottness; we have to be funny, too.
3. For Stalking.
This is probably my favorite aspect of social media. My junior year of high school, the swim team awarded me with the “Most Likely to Facebook Stalk You” award. At the time, I was embarrassed of my title and denied all FB Stalking accounts. Now I embrace it. The sheer amount of talent I possess in the realm of Facebook stalking is definitely on par with any professional government background search (except mine focuses on what people truly care about: relationship status and drama). It pains the depths of my soul that Facebook creeping is so frowned upon—I’m even still victim to looking down on someone when they inadvertently confess to it.
Example: On Thanksgiving break of my junior year of college, I was hanging out with my friend who invited someone that I had known since Elementary School, but hadn’t spoken with since 6th grade, to hang out with us. We were talking about theme parties, and I mentioned how one of my favorites was an Anything But Clothes party, to which she said, “I saw your pics from it—they were so cute!” I hadn’t attended an ABC party since my freshman year, and my first thought was, “What, are you stalking me?” I should be flattered that anyone would care about what I post since a lot of it is completely pointless, anyway. Also, who am I to judge when I’ll go on a photo viewing frenzy of people I haven’t seen, let alone spoken to, since high school, or maybe even middle school? And don’t deny it: you’ve totally done it as well.
Here’s another example of someone who’s stalking tactics mirror my own and should be commended: I met a guy at the mall who played Football for FSU, and I mentioned I swam for Clemson and that my name was Maddie. 10 minutes later I had a new friend request on Facebook, which means this guy had to either Google search “Clemson Swimming Maddie” or go directly to the roster to look me up and search me on Facebook. That’s both commitment and tech savvy. Snaps to FSU Football Player dude.
I don’t even have a Twitter and sometimes will get on to look at my friend’s Tweets to see what they’re up to. Am I that pathetic? Or do I just the guts to admit what everyone secretly does and thinks? And if you don’t do this then you might have a life, which is totally cool also.
So listen up, ladies—don’t get weirded out when you discover someone’s creeping on you. It gives you the only reason you use social media for: attention.
Man, this combined with my “drive-by” blog might lead to some restraining orders. Whoops.
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